Biryani is one of the most sensible dishes to make when you have large quantities of people for dinner ( as is typically the case at this time of the year for most Muslims). This Arabic dish was brought to India by travelling Muslim merchants and today it’s known and loved in most countries around the world. As can be expected, there are a myriad of recipes for it and it’s popularly made with chicken and there’s even a few vegetarian recipes. Mutton, however is our favourite but for those of you that find it to intense, feel free to use lamb. This recipe is the easiest we’ve ever found and nobody should really have a problem making it.

Ingredients

• 1kg mutton or lamb (no younger than 1 year) cubed
• 500 gm basmati rice.
• 4 hard boiled eggs
• 3 tsp saffron that has been steeped in about 100 ml of fresh milk
• 2 tsp garam masala.
• 6 red chilies
• 1 handful of cashew nuts
• 5 well sized cloves
• 2 cinnamon sticks
• 2 black cardamom pods
• 1 tsp cardamom seeds (from the green cardamom)
• 3 green chilies.
• 6 tbsp fresh coriander leaves, chopped
• 1 small bunch of fresh mint, chopped
• 2 generous tbsp grated fresh ginger
• 1 tbsp grated fresh garlic
• 250 ml curd well beaten (known as dahi it is the semi-solid result of fermenting milk that remains white with a creamy consistency).
• 2 limes, juice and grated zest
• 5 tbsp ghee or extra virgin olive oil
• 1or 2 handfuls finely sliced and crisply fried onions to garnish.
• Sea salt to taste

Method

• Grind the chillies and cashew nuts into a fine paste and set aside.
• Combine the beaten curd with the grated ginger and garlic and massage the mutton cubes well with this paste – set aside for about an hour.
• After an hour, heat the ghee (or the oil) and then fry the chilli paste until it becomes fragrant (a minute or two) and then add the mutton, about ¼ of the fried onions, 1 tsp garam masala and salt to taste.
• As strange as it may sound, when the ghee starts to separate from the mixture, add about 350 ml warm water and cook until tender – it will take a couple of hours and you’ll need to top up regularly (otherwise put this in a pressure cooker if you’re in a hurry).
• In the meantime, using a pan or a wok, fry the whole spices in a tbsp of ghee or olive oil and then add the rice and fry it a little as well, adding the green chillies and salt to taste before you add enough water for the rice to cook – remember basmati rice cooks very quickly.
• When the rice is cooked, spread it out on a plate and remove the spices.
• Next, combine the mint, the fresh coriander leaves, the rest of the garam masala and the crispy onions and set aside.
• Grease a sufficiently large baking dish with enough ghee and spread it with a layer of the rice mixture, cove it with mutton and then sprinkle half of the mint  mixture over it as well as the zest and juice of the lime.
• Place another layer of rice, mutton and mint mixture and follow with a final layer of rice.
• Sprinkle the rice with the saffron milk and the ghee and cover well.
• Bake for about 20 minutes on a pre-heated oven at 180 C – serve hot.